Labyrinth
by Katadenza
Summary: The morning after they arrive in Vocaloid Manor, the Vocaloid3's realize that the building was bigger and more complex than it seemed. Let's just say they end up slightly lost... One-shot.


**Author's Note: **More writing practice. Boop.  
Based off that one episode of _Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends_ (awesome show, imo) with a very similar plot.  
As I consider this my first full-blown story (with actual dialogue and characters and all that jazz), constructive criticism is _very_ welcome.

* * *

Everything looked alike. It was almost scary.

SeeU turned her head from one end of the corridor to the other. Doors on the right? Yep. Doors on the left? Affirmative. The white-painted walls seemed to mock her confusion, and she didn't notice the voice trying to bring her back to reality.

"SeeU-chan? SeeU-chan?! Hey, Earth to SeeU-chan!"

Jolted out of her thoughts, she turned her attention to the crowd of her fellow V3s, more specifically, the red-headed Vocaloid whose face was starting to match the color of her hair.

"We are in a _situation_ here, SeeU-chan. Can you pay a bit more attention?" Cul's eyes seemed to set everything on fire. SeeU wondered if Cul's head would set alight if she got any angrier.

SeeU nodded. Cul immediately continued her tirade.

"As I was saying, are you _sure_ nobody knows the way down? Like a map or anything? Anyone? Anyone?!" Her voice started veering to the edge of panic, eyes looking desperately at them all.

No one answered.

Cul made a deep heavy sigh and held her head in her hands.

"Well, we're screwed."

* * *

How exactly did this happen? SeeU wasn't sure herself.

She had been caught up in the excitement of being one of the new Vocaloids, of being a part of a new generation and just being alive in general. She remembered being in awe of the sheer size of the Vocaloid Manor, of the seemingly infinite rooms, one of which she got to now call her own.

She remembered falling asleep that night, anticipating a new beginning, a bright future, and many other nice sentimental things.

The next morning, she woke up vaguely remembering her assigned teal-haired mentor telling her about breakfast being at a certain time in the dining room on the ground floor. No problem.

It was only when she had stepped out the door of her room when she realized that she didn't quite know _how _to get to the ground floor.

She started to get a sinking feeling deep in the pit of her stomach, and she was sure it wasn't just hunger.

Luckily (or not), her fellow newcomers had also chosen rooms in the same corridor, and all would eventually realize the exact same thing.

* * *

"So," Aoki asked. "What do we do know?"

"Well, we can't possibly stay here all day," Mew answered absentmindedly, giving her cat Sabami a good rubbing behind the ears.

IA just smiled dreamily. "Don't worry," she murmured. "I'm sure the cosmos will find a way to help us."

Yukari just curled up further into her hoodie and said nothing. Neither did Mayu (who was using her ax's shiny surface as a mirror).

Rion just hummphed at all of them. "Well I _certainly_ can't save the future if I'm trapped in a corridor!"

Cul grunted and made for one end of the corridor. "I don't know about you guys, but I'm starving and it's nearly breakfast time. I'm going to find my way down with or without you!"

The V3s all looked at each other and decided to follow. SeeU noticed Aoki struggling to keep up with her 15-centimeter stature, and decided to pick her up and place her on top of her head (right between her cat ears).

Aoki giggled, holding onto a cat-ear for support. "Thank you, SeeU-chan!"

SeeU kept walking.

* * *

Walking.

Walking.

Walking.

More walking.

Even more walking.

_Jeez_, SeeU thought, _how big WAS this place?_

Rion groaned in agony. "How much further do we have to go?"

"Don't give up, Rion-chan! We'll get there eventually!" Aoki chirped.

"Well _you _don't have to walk! My feet hurt!"

SeeU was getting worried. How much further _did_ they have to go? It seemed no matter where they turned, they seemed to be walking down the same white corridor with the same identical brown doors.

Cul yelled from the front of the front of the pack. "Will you two SHUT UP?! I'm trying to find the stairs!"

There was silence again, at least for the next five minutes before Mayu started sharpening her ax on the wall.

* * *

They still haven't found the stairs.

Rion was now on the edge of panic. "I swear, this place is a freaking _maze_."

Aoki began to muse, "Maybe if we split up, we can find the stairs faste-" but was quickly interrupted by Cul.

"No splitting up! Absolutely _no_ _splitting up_! How many horror movies have you watched?!" While Rion was still on the edge, Cul had already tumbled over.

"I was only released yesterday..."

An awkward silence, only broken by Sabami's mewing.

"W-well..." Cul tried to regain her composure. "We're NOT splitting up, and that's FINAL."

Rion huffed. "Who died and made you queen?"

"Well, do YOU have any better idea where we're going, princess?" Cul turned on her and snarled. "Can that moe idol timey-wimey spacey-wacey mystic magic of yours magically transport us down the stairs? Or do I have to shove you down once we actually FIND it?"

"Hey, it's complicated _time travel_ that you PRIMITIVE piece of metal won't understand in a hundred years and I _know_ for a fact that I'm way WAY more moe than YOU!"

Things were starting to escalate really badly and as SeeU thought of interrupting someone beat her to it.

"Excuse me, if you two aren't too busy to listen to a "primitive piece of metal", the stairs are over there," Mew said, motioning to the stairway around the corner.

The argument quickly turned into a race to see who got to the stairs faster, not that anyone cared as they were all doing the same thing.

SeeU practically leaped down the stairs, already fantasizing about breakfast. She wondered if there would be any Korean cuisine, it had only been one day and she already missed the place.

Her mouth was still watering over imaginary _kimchi_ when she realized the stairs had stopped. Weren't they supposed to be longer, taking them to the ground floor? The sinking feeling returned full force. She looked up.

A white corridor with identical brown doors lining the sides. Exactly like the floor they had just left.

Among the V3s, SeeU could hear a faint sob.

* * *

Walking again.

What time was it now? Midday? Afternoon? Evening? The next morning entirely?

Her stomach was roaring in sheer need, and she cursed Master for including hunger as a feature.

Eventually, even Cul had to stop and lean against the wall. "You know what? We could be going in freaking circles for all we know."

"We need a new approach," Mew declared. "I read this Greek myth once about someone in a gigantic maze..."

"I've told you," IA laughed. "All we need to do is put our faith in the cosmos. It will see us through. Right Yu-chan?" The hoodie-wearing Vocaloid beside her blushed and nodded.

"Well, the cosmos isn't exactly being helpful right now," Cul grumbled. "What was that Greek thingy again, Mew-nee?"

"So this boy was challenged to navigate a maze, and he used a ball of string to find his way out. I don't presume anyone has string?" Mew scanned everyone

Cul thought for a second. "Well, we have Mayu-chan."

Mayu looked up in surprise. She had been dragging her ax along the wall the entire time, causing a long ugly-looking scratch mark to be formed in its wake.

Mew looked at it worryingly. "Aren't they going to get us to fix that?"

Cul waved it off. "Eh, it's just a scratch. Nothing to go ballistic about. It's _their _fault anyway for making this place so freaking confusing."

"That settles it then. "The End Justifies the Means" and all that," Mew got up to examine the scratch in closer detail. "Keep making this scratch, Mayu-chan. If we see it again, we'll know to turn back and try a different path. We have to run into the way out _eventually_."

"We'll all have starved by then," Cul commented, but started walking again.

"Consider yourselves lucky," Mew shot back. "The boy also had to deal with a carnivorous monster."

SeeU just kept her head down and focused on the beat of her footsteps. Aoki had gone silent a long time ago.

_Eventually, eventually, eventually..._

* * *

For the first time since they had started walking, no one spoke. They couldn't find the energy.

The only thing that could be heard was the sound of their own footsteps and the constant _ssscratching _and _scrrrraping_ of Mayu's ax.

SeeU tried not to hear, tried to block everything out, just tried put one foot in front of the other and repeat over and over.

The corridors seemed to extend infinitely, white and brown and white and brown and white and brown and white and brown and white and brown...

SeeU wondered how long it would take before they all went insane.

* * *

White and brown.

White and brown.

White and brown.

White and brown.

White.

White.

White.

_White._

Cul was the first to snap.

Sobbing, she threw herself against the wall. "Fuck... _fuck... _It's over... we're trapped... we're trapped here forever...!"

"N-no..." Rion was quickly following. "No, we're NOT! We're not going to die here! _I'm _not going to die here!"

"Guys, _please,_" Mew begged. "Pull yourselves together."

But her efforts were futile. One by one, the V3s dissolved into utter panic.

"I'M TOO CUTE TO DIE!" Rion wailed.

Mayu stopped dragging her ax against the wall and started hacking at it in desperation.

Aoki was yelling into SeeU's ear, "They're just lying right?! SeeU-chan?! We're almost there... we're almost there, RIGHT?!"

SeeU herself was curled up against the wall, rocking back and forth next to Yukari who was doing the exact same thing.

What now? Would she ever learn music? Was she ever going to be a singer? Was she ever going to see the sky again?

Amazingly, IA kept calm. "Don't panic, everyone! If we just believe in the cosmos hard enough, if we just wait long enough..."

Cul went over and shook her. Hard. "Listen to me and get your head out of the clouds you freaking _air-head_, the "cosmos" is _not _going to help us and it never WILL!"

IA just smiled. "You just don't _believe_, Cul-chan!"

That did it.

Letting go of IA, Cul screamed and ran haphazardly down the hallway. "Someone, anyone, PLEASE! Let me out! Let me _out_! Let me- OOOF!"

She had bumped into someone, knocking her to the floor.

A surprised Meiko stared down at her.

"Heh, when Luka-chan said you guys probably got lost, I guess she wasn't kidding," she chuckled, helping a stunned Cul up.

She looked out at the hallway full of shocked V3s. "Well don't just stand there, rookies! You're about three hours late for breakfast, and the producers aren't going to be happy you've kept them waiting this long. On your first day of work, too. Come on!"

Aoki hesitantly spoke up. "You... you know the way?"

"Of course I do," Meiko snorted. "I've lived here for seven years. I could find my way around this place in the dark. Now hurry up!"

Cul recovered and started sobbing again, clinging to Meiko as she walked away with the V3s following. "Saved... We're saved..."

IA looked satisfied. "The cosmos, it _never_ fails to deliver!"

* * *

They didn't have _kimchi_, but that didn't matter to SeeU.

She was lucky to have breakfast at all, never mind it was nearly noon.

One day, she thought, one day she was going to conquer those infinite corridors and race through them and go where she wanted. One day she would _learn._

But still, she was just a two-day-old Vocaloid. She had friends to make and songs to sing.

And a hot breakfast that wouldn't eat itself.

**_fin._**


End file.
